Born in Blood

Liam's face remained aloof as he saw the chakrams forming around her.

Right after, a few tendrils emerged from the chakrams – a mix of light and dark, creating twilight based weapons.

'Toys,' Liam thought with contempt. 

All there to pull Liam's attention away from the real issue. 

The most dangerous thing right now was the invisible, incinerating blade.

Not only was it out of sight, it was capable of turning Liam's powerful body into ash.

The only reason Liam felt its presence was due to his senses warning him of the hidden danger.

But if it was just that, Liam wouldn't have been slashed three times with the sword.

He was purposely being misled where it was. 

…

'There's more than one.'

'When I try to evade it and the sword in her hand, she slashes me with the other.'

'And now, she's got more than 24 different weapons to use.'

'Should I just use my Ashura Form and clobber her to death?'

'What if she uses her Recall Rune and manages to exit this place?'

'In the first place, my Ashura Form isn't as fast as her light, and I can only hold it for about 2 to 3 minutes.'

As Liam came to that conclusion, two full seconds had passed.

Doubling the mental energy of a cultivator had honed their focus and mind to a scary degree, allowing for almost instantaneous deductions.

All the while, the roaring ogre Liam was perched upon tried to swat him off like he was a fly, restlessly thrashing around.

"Are you gonna hide up there for the rest of the fight?" Reyan sneered. "Come down."

Liam smiled crookedly. "Make me."

Twilight looked at Liam with contempt burning in her eye. 

"You're just as annoying as him."

All of her chakrams suddenly shot towards the ogre's bulging stomach, ripping through its entrails and siphoning away its life. 

The ogre attempted to swing his club again, but looked anorexic after 10 seconds.

With no more energy left in its body, it started to fall, and Liam accompanied its descent.

As Liam fell, Reyan's form started to beam with light.

HHMMM!

Another flash was incoming.

Liam contemplated whether or not he should use his sword style.

By the end of it, he chose not to.

There were still too many things he didn't know about Twilight's techniques.

More importantly, Liam's chaos reserves were not as vast. 

And the destructive sword style that Liam developed burned through it like gas.

Thus, Liam's Black Blade turned into the Little Demons.

The odachi wasn't fit for the job.

The Breaker was too slow and too titanic.

The Dusk Blades were perfect.

WHOOM!

Before she flashed, Liam threw a dozen different Shadow Bombs on the ground.

They exploded with black smoke and spread in every direction, but Reyan was undeterred. 

Wherever her light touched, the dark gas evaporated. 

But Liam knew as much. 

It was meant just to deter her slightly, along with the goblins nearby. 

CLING! CLANG! SHING! 

Liam's two Dusk Blades looked like black streaks as they clashed against Reyan's 24 chakrams, her light-sword and sharp-tipped tendrils.

An obnoxious clangor filled the fake rowdy fake dimension.

Liam was so fast!

All his swings were just blurs that overlapped with each other.

As of now, Liam's body was incredibly streamlined and slim, giving him a boost of speed.

Liam's Blood Bonds left his Inner World and covered his flanks and rear.

The Apex Hawk, Death Wolf and Black Hunter were basically damage sponges.

Although they were each strong in their own right, right now, they weren't viable for offense.

On top of it all, Liam was silently weaving together a cocoon of Sanguine Strings to catch Reyan by surprise.

He was hiding the wafer-thin needles with his illusions, and they—

BOOOOM!

An explosion of blinding light suddenly took over the battlefield.

In excruciating detail, Liam felt layers and layers of his skin melt apart, then slowly reform under his regeneration. 

He flew through the air, over a sea of goblins and ogres, and Reyan followed suit, aiming to finish him off.

It was clear that she realized who she was fighting.

She was using Mind Edge.

'Enough games!' Liam thought, his solar plexus burning with chaos that enveloped his two Dusk Blades.

A massive chunk of mental energy entered the slash inside his sea of consciousness. Liam felt everything retract and sharpen.

'Enough playing with my food!'

Reyan still continued with her trajectory, aiming to finish Liam off while he still soared through the air. 

But as her chakrams and invisible swords got close to Liam, they wobbled with disruption and just… sputtered out of existence.

When she swung across Liam's waist, she expected her chakrams, invisible swords, and tendrils to slice into his skin.

Now, there was only her physical sword!

CLING!

And it was blocked a second later.

Reyan tried to Flash to safety.

It didn't work.

She was too close.

Too close to Liam, too close to that strange, bright red energy.

And she couldn't escape.

Right now, Twilight was like a panther trapped with a lion.

Fear.

Fear tainted her mental waves and gripped her heart.

CLANG!

Then came the chaotic swings that Liam called a sword style. 

SHING!

With just one sword, Reyan did her best to deflect and dodge Liam's barrage of strikes, swipes and stabs. 

CLANG! SHING! CLING!

It was an admirable effort.

SHING! 

But she depended too much on spells and her light. 

Liam's swords started to claim entire pounds of flesh. 

The Dusk Blades stripped skin off. The Dusk Blades cut muscles off. And the Breaker broke bones.

Goblins attempted to intervene, just to be swept up in his flurry and get violently butchered.

It was a beatdown. 

From pride and confidence, to fear, to terror, and now, to despair. 

In a last stand attack, a Honed, blade-shaped mass of Reyan's mental energy tried to pierce Liam's mind, but Liam ducked under just before it rendered him braindead.

SHING!

Using an octopus tendril paired with a clean swing, Liam seized Reyan's left arm.

SHING!

Followed by her right hand.

BANG!

Followed by her head.

The last thing Reyan saw before her vision went dark was Liam's crooked smirk, and real appearance. 

Victory.

Liam had done it.

Silence.

There was no grand announcement.

Liam waited patiently.

The goblins suddenly froze. 

Liam swept around in confusion.

Silence.

A low, sadistic, and spine-chilling laughter that sounded more like a continuous wheeze grew louder, until it became a sonorous laugh.

...

Liam's heart sank.